Mama, I'm in Love With a Criminal

by Llani Froeber

Student Life Editor

December 2022

Evan Peters as Jeffrey Dahmer in Dahmer - Monster (2022)

Young People are falling in love with serial killers . From the cannibalistic acts performed by Jeffery Dahmer to the homicides conducted by Ted Bundy, our youth has been conditioned to adore vile individuals, regardless of their crimes. Who or what may be at fault for this generation's recent outbreak in trend? Well, many would say the answer to that would be social media in itself.

Psychology teacher, Samantha Hoppe claimed, “ Social media, in general, has desensitized us to a lot of things, including violence associated with serial killers.”

She continued, “ Then you add commenting on TikTok and Instagram, and now you've rationalized other people's thoughts.”

For example, a TikTok video posted on September fifteenth by user 29kbux compared the reactions of killers’ when being sentenced to death in court. The video showed how today’s generation of killers became distressed and tended to become emotional when they found out. While the older generation stayed calm and collected. In the background of the fifteen-second video the song Gangsta’s Paradise, by Coolio, played.

Many in the comments debated whether the edited clip glorified the killers or if it was just a harmless comparison.

One user, wheidksk_rr said, “ Maybe we shouldn’t be putting them in any kind of good light.”

Another brookealicecurrie agreed. “ Feels like they’re being glorified to me, which feels so wrong.”

On the other hand, some argued that the video's intent was simply to compare the differences in reactions, with no intent of glorification.

However, shining any sort of spotlight down onto these criminals results in some shape or form of glorification; regardless of intent. Excessive discussion and sharing of horrific incidents bring a vast amount of attention to them also. It gives the killers and their blood trail a redundant legacy that causes the victim’s families to constantly relive their everlasting loss.

Junior Jadyn Gibson claimed, “ I think crime and some pretty terrible stuff has become so normalized in society and people seem to latch on to that type of stuff now.”

Latching onto these types of ideologies then creates an environment where right and wrong become blurred together.

“I think the general nature of serial killers is that they usually are extremely charismatic, making them more attractive and more dangerous,” Hoppe stated. “ I don't know that people are necessarily attracted to the crimes they are committing, but instead, they are blinded by charisma and manipulation.”

This would otherwise be known as hybristophilia, the attraction to or interest in those who have committed crimes.

One well-known serial killer, Ted Bundy, used his good looks and charisma to allure his victims; targeting young females who found him irresistible. The infatuation by the public’s eye was only enhanced when Bundy was portrayed by actor, Zac Efron, in the Netflix documentary, Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile.

Even serial killers who would not be considered attractive by today’s standards are being romanticized.

This was demonstrated in the newest docu-series on Netflix called, Dahmer-Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story.

Evan Peters, a well-known American actor played the plain-looking cannibalistic killer, Jeffrey Dahmer, and it caused controversy throughout the media.

Peter has been deemed as attractive in the eyes of today’s beauty standards and because of this, it resulted in viewers believing they’re captivated by the killer himself.

Hoppe explained, “ I think there's a form of classical conditioning happening here. If we have attractive people playing serial killers in movies and tv series, then we begin to associate their attractiveness with the killers themselves. This makes it harder to detach, in our minds, our own feelings from our morals.”

We’ve been conditioned to believe we’re falling in love with serial killers. However the youth are not at fault, instead, they are victims of psychological warfare.